Survival needs

This was a crucial issue and basic to *Darwin's theory: No creature could have much more ability than the other creatures around it or the "struggle for existence" and the "survival of the fittest" could not produce evolutionary change. In the case of man's brain, *Darwin assumed that Europeans were highly intelligent because they had competed against third-world natives who, *Darwin thought, only had intelligence slightly above that of apes. But *Wallace had lived with natives in primitive tropical lands—and had discovered their minds to be as advanced as those of Europeans; their knowledge was different, but not their mental faculties. Therefore, all mankind had intelligence far in advance of any animal in the world, and Darwinian theory was hopelessly wrong.

"Wallace, Charles Darwin's 'junior partner' in discovering natural selection, had a disturbing problem: He did not believe their theory could account for the evolution of the human brain.

"In the Origin of Species (1859), Darwin had concluded that natural selection makes an animal only as perfect as it needs to be for survival in its environment. But it struck Wallace that the human brain seemed to be a much better piece of equipment than our ancestors really needed.

"After all, he reasoned, humans living as simple tribal hunter-gatherers would not need much more intelligence than gorillas. If all they had to do was gather plants and eggs and kill a few small creatures for a living, why develop a brain capable, not merely of speech, but also of composing symphonies and doing higher mathematics?

"Neverthess, Wallace's problem remains unsolved; the emergence of the human mind is still a mystery."—*R. Milner, Encyclopedia of Evolution (1990), p. 457.

In marked contrast with the remarkable intelligence of man, which is so far above any other living creature in our world, is the fact that the apes, which according to Darwin man descended from, have such poor minds that they hardly know how to devise tool-using by themselves! After discussing tool-using birds and animals, *MacRoberts explains that the reason the apes are thought to be so intelligent is because people assume they are. "If Leakey had seen the Galapagos finch prying and stabbing hidden grubs with cactus spines, or watched California woodpeckers chisel trees into collective 'granaries' for storing acorns, would he say we would have to change the definition of man—or birds?

"No, because primatologists are like doting parents. Anything 'their' monkeys or apes do is remarkably clever, because they expect them to be bright. And anything other animals do is 'just instinct,' because they're supposed to be far removed from man."—*Michael MacRoberts, quoted in R. Milner, Encyclopedia of Evolution (1990), p. 438.

THE LANGUAGES OF MAN—(*#16/1 Where Languages Lead Us*) Just as the human eye is amazing, so human speech is utterly astounding. How could mankind gain the ability to speak, when all other creatures can only utter a few sounds? *Chomsky of MIT, the world's foremost linguist, said this:

"Human langauge appears to be a unique phenomenon, without significant analogue in the animal world."—*Noam Chomsky, Language and Mind (1972), p. 67.

A leading evolutionist spokesman added this comment: "Human language is absolutely distinct from any system of communication in other animals. That is made most clear by comparison with animal utterances, which most nearly resemble human speech and are most often called 'speech.' Non-human vocables are, in effect, interjections. They reflect the individual's physical or, more frequently, emotional state. They do not, as true language does, name, discuss, abstract, or symbolize."—*George Gaylord Simpson, "The Biological Nature of Man, " in Science, April 22, 1966, p. 476.

"Experiments with chimpanzees who 'talk' in sign language show that they can signal for things and get them, but 'they don't describe. They don't argue . . They have no value system. They don't make moral decisions . . They don't know they're going to die . . We must never judge animals as if they were just badly brought-up human beings."—*Sir John Eccles, "Photons, Philosophy, and Eccles, " in Washington Post, March 15, 1981, p. F-1.

*Lancaster and others spent long periods studying the chattering of monkeys and trying to relate it to human language, but without success.

"The more that is known about it, the less these systems seem to help in the understanding of human language."—*J.B. Lancaster, The Origin of Man (1965).

Human language buffaloes the scientists. There is no way it can fit into evolutionary theories. Language marks an unbridgeable gulf between man and all other life-forms on our planet.

"The use of language is very closely associated with the superior thinking ability of humans. In his ability to communicate man differs even more from other animals than he does in his learning or thinking . . We know absolutely nothing about the early stages in the development of language."—*Ralph Linton, The Tree of Culture (1955), pp. 8-9.

Human language is astounding. As far back as we go. it has always been totally developed! Yet all available data informs us that writing did not begin until after 2500 B.C.!

Earlier in his life, the author studied three ancient languages as well as several contemporary ones, and he was surprised to find that ancient ones were much more complicated than modern ones!

In ancient times, some races would alternately write backward and forward: one line from left to right, and the next line from right to left, etc. Boustrophon, the Greeks called it; "as the ox turns with the plow," all the while using no paragraphs, and not even spaces between word and sentences! The result was very complicated reading, to say the least.

Here is how the Greeks would write the above paragraph about 1700 years ago. They obviously had smarter brains back then: